


some other that i swore i'd never touch

by OfShoesAndShips



Series: those of us who are lost and low [6]
Category: Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell - Susanna Clarke
Genre: Background Polyamory, F/M, Post-Canon, i may write more idk yet
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-01-14
Updated: 2016-01-14
Packaged: 2018-05-13 22:20:38
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 817
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5719123
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/OfShoesAndShips/pseuds/OfShoesAndShips
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Childermass pines. Arabella takes action. No I did not steal that from Book's proxemics. (yes I did)</p>
            </blockquote>





	some other that i swore i'd never touch

**Author's Note:**

> Kind-of a sequel to this fic: http://archiveofourown.org/works/5368385

The first time, it is a few months after the return; she is not quite used to Hurtfew yet, not quite used to Yorkshire, not quite used to the man her husband has become - she loves him, and he her, just as strongly and just as deeply as they ever did, but in the interim they have changed, and both their hearts have opened out.

 

And here she stands, in a small, whitewashed room tucked up under the eaves, where, if she gave a single damn for propriety she absolutely should not be. Because John Childermass is standing a few paces from her in his shirtsleeves, and she cannot pull her eyes from him.

 

He looks so much smaller, like this. His cuffs are looser than they should be, his shoulders not as broad as they seem under his greatcoat, and the tie on his waistcoat is pulled so tight she’s surprised the fabric does not ripple over his ribcage.

 

He is staring at her. He has not stopped staring since he turned and found her there on his threshold.

 

“Mrs Strange?”

 

She opens her mouth to reply - to say his name in return, to ask him to call her Arabella, to ask him why he has hidden himself up here all day, to ask him why he flushes when she catches him staring, she doesn’t actually know.

 

“Did you draw this?” she asks, eventually, showing him the piece of paper she had found that morning, tucked into her book; on it, a pencil sketch of her, lightly coloured with chalk.

 

He blinks, pulls his eyes away from her to glance at it. “I - I apologise, Mrs Strange, it was - far too forward of me, I-;”

 

“That is not what I meant,” she says, and takes a step closer.

 

He looks as if he is about to say something else, but stays quiet instead, dropping his gaze to the floor.

 

“I think it beautiful.”

 

He closes his eyes, looks to be struggling to hold down the rising blush. “You are very kind, Mrs Strange, but I know it for a substandard piece of work, I should not have-;”

 

“John,” she interrupts, and his eyes snap open in shock.

 

“Mrs Strange-;”

 

“Arabella.”

 

She has been walking slowly forwards with each word and she stands only a foot from him now, close enough to hear him breathe, to see the thin silvery scar on his cheek. Close enough to reach up and run her fingers lightly along it, close enough to hear his ragged sigh as she does.

 

He starts to say her name, gets barely past the ‘m’ when she shushes him.

 

“Arabella,” she says, again.

 

“Arabella,” he whispers, hardly audible.

 

“There,” she says, and smiles before clenching his lapel in one hand and tugging him down.

 

He does not kiss like she expected. He is gentle, so extraordinarily gentle, his hands coming up to cradle her face, pressing forward the barest fraction - it is odd, welcome certainly but odd. She had always seen in him a wildness, and she had, in some quiet, fanciful corner of her mind, expected his kiss - for she had imagined it rather more often than perhaps she ought - to be as rough and as wild as the moors he came from. But he is not like that at all. His hands are work-rough but he touches her as if he fears she is not quite there, kisses her not like a man drowning but as if he is terrified to breathe.

 

She tightens her grip on his waistcoat and pulls him in closer against her, feeling the warmth of his chest through the fabric of his shirt, and she was right, he is far too thin but then his hands are in her hair and she forgets to think.

 

After a moment he steps back, blinking, his hands falling to clasp her elbows and his mouth kiss-bitten, cheeks red, eyes wide, as if shocked. Surely he hadn’t simply expected her to see the drawing and put it aside, never to consider it again?

 

“Mr Strange-;” he starts.

 

“You know my husband and I have never been conventional,” she says, with a slight hint of reproof.

 

“I meant-;” he breaks off again, still looking entirely lost.

 

It hits her then and she curses herself that she had not thought of it before. “I do not require you to get along,” she says, “No more than Gilbert asks of the two of you. Less, perhaps. He told me, you see, his version of what happened between you. Which knowing Jonathan may be very different from yours, but no. I do not ask you to bury the trouble between you.”

 

He steps towards her, then, raising one hand to trace the curve of her jaw before bending down and pressing his lips to hers, so gently.

 

“Thank you,” he whispers when he pulls back, “Arabella.”


End file.
